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A LECTURE 



DELIVERED 



IN THE TREMONT TEMPLE, 

BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS, 

ON THE 24th JANUARY, 1856, 



^AX^^ 



E. TOOMBS. 



SLAVERY— ITS CONSTITUTIONAL STATUS ITS INFLUENCE ON THE AFRICAN RACE 

AND SOCIETY. 



I propose to submit to you tLis evening some considerations and reflections 
upon two points. 

\st. The constitutional powers and duties of the Federal Government in rela- 
tion to Domestic Slaverv. 

Id. The influence of Slavery as it exists in the United States upon the Slave 

and Society. 

Under the first head I shall endeavor to show that Congress has no power to 
limit, restrain, or in any manner to impair slavery; but, on the contrary, itis 
bound to protect and maintain it in the States where it exists, and wherever its 
flag floats, and its jurisdiction is paramount. 

On the second point, I maintain that so long as tbe African and Caucassian 
races co-exist in the same society, that the subordination of the African is its nor- 
mal, necessary and proper condition, and that such subordination is the condition 
best calculated to promote the highest interest and the greatest happiness of both 
races, and consequently of the whole society : and that the abolition of slavery, 
under these conditions, is not a remedy for any of the evils of the systein. I ad- 
mit that the truth of these propositions, stated under the second point, is essen- 
tially necessary to the existence and permanence of the system. They rest on 
the truth that the white is the superior race, and the black the inferior, and that 
subordination, with or without law, will be the status of the African m this mix- 
ed society, and, therefore, it is the interest of both, and especially of the black 
race, and of the whole society, that this status should be fixed, controlled, and pro- 
teeted by law. The perfect equality of the superior race, and the legal subordi- 
nation of the inferior, are the foundations on which we have erected our republican 
systems. Their soundness must be tested by their conformity to the sovereignty 
of right, the universal law which ought to govern all people in all centuries. This 
soveieignty of right is justice, commonly called natural justice, not the vague un- 
certainlmaginings of men, but natural justice as interpreted by the written oracles,. 
and read by the''light of the revelations of nature's God. In this sense I recog- 
nize a " higher law^' and the duty of all men, by legal and proper means, to bring, 
every society in conformity with it. 



I proceed to the consideration of the first point. 

The old thirteen States, before the revolution, were dependent colonies of Great 
Britain — each was a separate and distinct political community, with different laws, 
and each became an independent and sovereign State by the declaration of Inde- 
pendence. At the time of this declaration slavery was a fact, and a fact recog- 
nized by law in each of them, and tbe slave trade was lawful commerce by the 
laws of nations and the practice of mankind. This declaration was drafted by a 
slaveholder, adopted by the representatives of slaveholders, and did not emanci- 
pate a single Afiican slave ; but, on the contrary, one of the charges which it sub- 
mitted to the civilized world against King George was, that he had attempted to 
excite "domestic insurrection among us." At the time of this declaration we had 
no common government ; the articles of confederation were submitted to the rep- 
resentatives of the States eight days afterwards, and were not adopted by all of 
the States until 1*781. These loose and imperfect articles of union sufficed to 
bring us successfully through the revolution. Common danger was a stronger 
bond of union than these articles of confederation, after that ceased, they w«re 
inadequate to the purposes of peace. They did not emancipate a single slave. 

The Constitution was framed by delegates elected by the State legislatures. It 
was an emanation from the sovereign States as independent, separate, communi- 
ties. It was ratified by conventions of these separate States, each acting for itself. 
The members of these conventions represented the sovereignty of each State, but 
they were not elected by the whole people of either of the States. Minois, wo- 
men, slaves, Indians, Africans, bond and free, were excluded from participating in 
this act of sovereignty. Neither were all the white male inhabitants, over twenty- 
one years old, allowed to participate in it. Some were excluded because they had no 
laud, others for the want of good characters, others again because they were non- 
freemen, and a large number were excluded for a great variety of still more unim- 
portant reasons. None exercised this high privilege except those upon whom 
each State, for itself, had adjudged it wise, safe, and prudent to confer it. 

By this Constitution these States granted to the Federal Government certain 
well defined and clearly specified powers in orde: to " to make a more -perfect 
Union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, 2)rovide for the common de- 
fence and general welfare, and to secure the blessings of liberty to {themselves and 
their) posterityT And with great wisdom and forecast this Constitution lays 
down a plain, certain, and sufficient rule for its own interpretation, by declaring 
that " the poioers not herein delegated to the United States by the Constitution, 
nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the 
people.''^ The Federal Government is therefore a limited Government. It is lim- 
ited expressly to the exercise of the enumerated powers, and of such others only 
^^ which shall be necessary and i^roper to carry into execution''' these enumerated 
powers. The declaration of the purposes for which these powers were granted can 
neither increase or diminish them. If any one or all of them were to fail by reason 
of the insufficiency of the granted powers to secure them, that would be a good 
reason for a new gi'ant, but could never enlarge the granted powers. That dec- 
laration was itself a limitation instead of an enlargement of the granted powers. 
If a power expressly granted be used for any other purpose than those declared, 
such use would be a violation of the grant and a fraud on the Constitution, and 
therefore it follows, that if anti-slavery action by Congress is not warranted by 
any express power, nor within any of the declared purposes for which any such 
,power was granted, the exercise of even a granted power to effect that action, under 
.any pretence whatever, would fall under the just condemnation of the Constitution. 
The history of the times, and the debates in the convention which framed the 
Constitution, show that this whole subject was much considered by them, and 
"perplexed them in the extreme ;" and these provisions of the Constitution which 
related to it, were earnestly considered by the State conventions, which adopted 
it. Incipient legislation, providing for emancipation, had already been adopted by 



some of the States. Massacliusetts had declared that slavery was extinguished in 
her limits by her bill of rights; the African slave-trade had been legislated against 
in many of the States, including Virginia and Maryland, and North Carolina. The 
public mind was unquestionably tending towards emancipation. This feeling dis- 
played itself in the South as well as in the North. Some of the delegates from 
the present slaveholding States thought that the power to abolish, not only the 
African slave-trade, but slavery in the States, ought to be given to the Federal 
Government; and that the Constitution did not take this shape, was made one of 
the most prominent objections to it by Luther Martin, a distinguished member of 
the convention from Maryland, and Mr. Mason of Virginia, was not far behind 
him in his emancipation principles ; Mr. Madison sympathised to a great extent, 
to a much greater extent than some of the representatives from Massachusetts, in 
this anti-slavery feeling; hence we find that anti-slavery feelings were extensive- 
ly indulged in by many members of the convention, both from slaveholding and 
non-slaveholdiug States. This fact has led to many and grave errors ; artful and 
unscrupulous men have used it much to deceive the northern public. Mere opin- 
ions of individual men have been relied upon as authoritative expositions of the 
Constitution. Om' reply to them is simple, direct: they were not the opinions of 
the collective body of the people, who made, and who had the right to make this 
government ; and, therefore, they found no place in the organic law, and by that 
alone are we bound ; and, therefore, it concerns us rather to know what was the 
collective will of the whole, as afBrmed by the sovereign States, than what were 
the opinions of individual men in the convention. We wish to know what was 
done by the whole, not what some of the members thought was best to be done. 
The result of the struggle was, that not a single clause was inserted in the Con- 
stitution giving power to the Federal Government any where, either to abolish, 
limit, restrain, or in any other manner to impair the system of slavery in the 
United States : but on the contrary every clause which was inserted in the Con- 
stitution on this subject, does in fact, and was intended either to increase it, to 
strengthen it, or to protect it. To support these positions, I appeal to the Consti- 
tution itself, to the contemporaneous and all subsequent authoritative interpreta- 
tions of it. The Constitution provides for the increase of slavery by prohibiting 
the suppression of the slave-trade for twenty years after its adoption. It declares 
in the Ist clause of the 9th section of the first article, that " the migration or im- 
portation of such persons as any of the States now existing shall think proper to 
admit, shall not be pirohibited by the Congress prior to the year 1808, but a tax or 
duty may be imposed on such importation, not exceeding ten dollars for each per- 
son^ After that time it was left to the discretion of Congress to prohibit, or not 
to prohibit, the African slave-trade. The extension of this trafic in Africans from 
1800 to 1808, was voted for by the whole of the New England States, including 
Massachusetts, and opposed by Virginia and Delaware; and the clause was insert- 
ed in the Constitution by votes of the New England States. It fostered an active 
and profitable trade for New England capital and enterprise for twenty years, by 
which a large addition was made to the original stock of Africans in the United 
States, and thereby it increased slavery. This clause of the Constitution was 
specially favored, it was one of those clauses which was protected against amend- 
ment by article fifth. 

Slavery is strengthened by the 3d clause, 2d section of 1st article, which fixes 
the basis of representation according to numbers by providing that the '''■numbers 
shall be determined by adding to the ivhole number of free persons, including those 
bound to service for a term of years, and excluding Indians not taken, three-fifths 
of all other persons. " This provision strengthens slavery by given the existing 
slaveholding States many more representatives in Congress than they would have 
if slaves were considered only as property ; it was much debated, but finally 
adopted, with the full understanding of its import, by a great majority. 

The Constitution protects it, impliedly, by withholding all power to injure it. 



or limit its duration, but it protec/s it expressly hy the Sd clause of 2d section 
of the ith article, hy the 4th section of the 4th article, and hy the \5th clause of 
the 1st article. The 3d clause of the 2d section, 4th article, provides that " no' 
persons held to service or labor in one State by the laws thereof, escaping into 
another, shall in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from 
such service or labor, but shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom 
such service or labor may be due. " The 4th section of the 4th article provides 
that Congress shall protect each State " on application of the legislature (or of 
the executive when the legislature cannot be convened) against domestic violence." 
The loth clause of the 8th section of the 1st article, makes it the duty of 
Cono-ress " to provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the Union, 
suppress insurrections, and repel invasions," The first of these three clauses last 
referred to protects slavery by following the esoai)ing slave iuto nori-slaveholding 
States and returning him to bondage, the other clauses place the whole military 
power of the Republic in the hands of the Federal Government to repress " domes- 
tic violence" and " insurections." Under this Constitution, if he flies to other 
lands, the supreme law follows, captures, and returns him ; if he resists the law by 
which he is held in bondage, the same Constitution brings its military power to 
liis subjugation. There is no limit to this ])rotection, it must exist as long as any 
of the States tolerate domestic slavery and the Constitution unaltered, endures. 
None of these clauses admit of misconception or doubtful construction. They 
were not incorporated into the charter of our liberties by surprise or inattention, 
they were each and all of them introduced into that body, debated, referred to 
committees, reported upon, and adopted. Our construction of them is supported 
by one unbroken and harmonious current of decisions and adjudications by the 
Executive, Legislature, and Judicial Departments of the Government, State and 
Federal, from President Washington to President Pierce. Twenty representatives 
in the Congress of the United States hold their seats to-day, by the virtue of one 
of these clauses. The African slave trade was carried on its whole appointed 
period under another of them. Thousands of slaves have been delivered up under 
another, and it is a just cause of congratulation to the whole country that no occa- 
sion has occurred to call into action the remaining clauses which have been quoted. 
These constitutional provisions were generally acquiesced in even by those who 
did not approve them, until a new and less obvious question sprung out of the ac- 
quisition of territory. When the Constitution was adopted the question of slave- 
ry had been settled in the northwest territory by the articles of session of that ter- 
ritory by the State of Virginia, and at that time the United States had not an acre 
of land over which it claimed unfettered jurisdiction except a disputed claim on our 
southwestern boundary, which will hereafter be considered in its appropriate con- 
nection. The acquisition of Louisiana imposed upon Congress the necessity of its 
government. This duty was assumed and performed for the general benefit of the 
whole country without challenge or question for nearly seventeen years. Equity and 
good faith shielded it from criticism. But in 1819, thirty years after the Consti- 
tution was adopted, upon application of Missouri for admission into the Union, the 
extraordinary pretension was, for the first time, asserted by a majority of the non- 
slaveholding States, that Congress not only had the power to prohibit the exten- 
sion of slavery into new territories of the Republic, but that it had power to com- 
pel new States seeking admission iuto the Union to prohibit it in their own con- 
stitutions and mould their domestic policy in all respects to suit the opinions, whims, 
or caprices of the Federal Government. This novel and extraordinary pretension 
subjected the whole power of Congress over the territories to the severest criticism. 
Abundant authority was found in the Constitution to manage this common domain 
merely as property ; the 2d clause, 3d section of the 4tli article, declares " that 
Congress shall have power to dispose of and make all needful rules and regulations 
respecting the territory or other property helonging to the United States; and no- 
thing in this Constitution shall he so construed as to prejudice any claims of the 



5 

United States or of any particular Stated But tliis clause was rightfully adjudi- 
cated by the supreme judicial authority not to confer on Congress general jurisdic- 
tion over territories, but by its terms to restrain that jurisdiction to their manage- 
ment as property, and oven without that adjudication, it would not be difficult to 
prove the utter disregard of all sound principles of construction of this attempt to 
expand this simple duty "to dispose of and make all needful rules and regulations 
concerning the territory and other property of the United States" into this gigantic 
assumption of unlimited power in all cases whatsoever over the territories. When 
the Constitution seeks to confer this power, it uses appropriate language ; when it 
wished to confer this power over the District of Columbia and the places to be 
acquired for forts, magazines, and arsenals, it gives Congress power " to exercise 
exclusive legislation in all cases whatsoever over them." This is explicit, it is apt 
language to express a particular purpose, and no ingenuity can construe the clause 
concerning the territories into the same meaning. 

This construction was so clear that Congress was then driven to look for power 
to govern its acquisitions in the necessity and propriety of it as a means of exe- 
cuting the express power to make treaties. The right to acquire territory under 
the treaty-making power, was itself an implication, and an implication whose 
rightfulness was denied by Mr. Jefferson, who exercised it ; the right to govern 
being claimed as an incident of the right to acquire, was then but an implication 
of an implication, and the power to exclude slavery therefrom was still another 
remove from the fountain of all power — express grant. But whether this 
power to prohibit slavery in the common territories be claimed from the one source 
or the other, it cannot be sustained upon any sound rule of constitutional con- 
struction. The power is not expressly granted. Then unless it can be shown to 
be both "necessary and proper" in order to the just execution of a granted power, 
the constitutional argument against it is complete. This remains to be shown by 
the advocates of this power. Admit the power in Congress to govern the terri- 
tories until they shall be admitted as States into the Union — derive it either from 
the clause of the Constitution last referred to, or from the treaty making power, 
this power to prohibit slavery is not an incident to it in either case, because it is 
neither " necessary nor proper" to its execution, — that it is not necessary to execute 
the treaty-making power, is shown from the fact that the treaty power not only 
was never used for this purpose, but can be wisely and well executed without it, 
and has been repeatedly used to increase and protect slavery. The acquisitions 
of Louisiana and Florida are examples of its use without the exercise of this pre- 
tended " necessary and proper " incident. Numerous treaties and conventions, 
with both savage and civilized nations, from the foundation of the Government, 
demanding and receiving indemnities for injuries, to this species of property are 
conclusive against this novel pretension. That it is not necessary to the execution 
of the power "to make needful rules and regulations respecting the territory and 
other property of the United States," is proven from the fact that seven territories 
have been governed by Congress, and trained into sovereign States, without its ex- 
ercise. It is not proper, because it seeks to use an implied power for other and 
different purposes from any specified, expressed or intended by the grantors. The 
purpose is avowed to be, to limit, restrain, weaken, and finally crush out shivery, 
whereas the grant expressly j^rovides for strengthening and protecting it. It is 
not proper, because it violates the fundamental condition of the Union — the 
equality of the States. The States of the Union are all political equals — each 
State has the same rights as every other State — no more, no less. The exercise 
c f this prohibition vioLites this equality and violates justice. By the laws of na- 
tions, acquisitions, either by purchase or conquest, even in despotic governments, 
enure to the benefit of all of the subjects of the State ; the reason given for this 
principle, by the most approved publicists, is, that they are the fruits of the com- 
mon blood and treasure. This prohibition destroys this equality, excludes a part of 
the joint owners from an equal participation and enjoyment of the common do- 



main and against justice and riglit, appropriates it to the greater number. There- 
fore so far from being a necessary and proper means of executing granted powers, 
it is' an arbitrary and despotic usurpation, against the letter, tlie spirit, and the 
decLared purposes of the Constitution ; for its exercise neither " promotes a more 
perfect union, nor establishes justice, nor insures domestic tranquility, nor provides 
for the common defence, nor promotes the general -welfare, nor secures the bless 
ings of liberty to ourselves or our posterity," but on the contrary, puts in jeop- 
ardy all these inestimable blessings. It loosens the bonds of union, seeks to 
establish injustice, disturbs doinestic tranquility, weakens the common defence, 
and endangers the general welfare by sowing hatreds and discords among our 
people, and puts in eminent peril the liberties of the white race, by whom and 
for whom the Constitution was made, in a vain effort, to bring them down to an 
equality with the African or to raise the African to an equality with them. Pro- 
vidence has ordered it otherwise, and vain will be the efforts of man to resist this 
decree. This effort is as wicked as it is foolish and unauthorized. It does not 
benefit, but injures the black race ; penning them up in the old States will neces- 
sarily make them more wretched and miserable, but will not strike a fetter from 
their limbs. It is a simple wrong to the white race, but it is the refinement of 
cruelty to the blacks. Expansion is as necessary to the increased comforts of the 
slave as to the prosperity of the master. 

The constitutional construction of this point by the South works no wrong to 
any portion of the Republic, to no sound rules of construction, and promotes the 
declared purposes of the Constitution. We simply propose that the common terri- 
tories be left open to the common enjoyment of all the people of the United States, 
that they shall be protected in their persons and property by the Federal Govern- 
ment until its authority is superseded by a State constitution, and then we propose 
that the character of the domestic institutions of the new State be determined by 
the freemen thereof. This is justice — this is constitutional equality. 

But those who claim the power in behalf of Congress to exclude slavery from 
the common territories, rely rather on precedent and authority than upon prin- 
ciple to support the pretension. In utter disregard of the facts, they boldly pro- 
claim that Congress has from the beginning of the Government, uniformly assert- 
ed, and repeatedly exercised this power. This assertion I will proceed to show is 
not supported by a single precedent up to 1820. Before that time the general 
duty to protect this great interest equally with every other, both in the tenito- 
ries and elsewhere, was universally admitted and fairly performed by eveiy De- 
partment of the Government. The act of lY93 was passed to secure the delivery 
up of fugitives from labor, escaping to the non-slaveholding States ; our navigation 
laws authorized their transportation on the high seas, the Government demanded 
and frequently received compensation for owners of slaves, for injuries sustained in 
these lawful voyages by the interference of Foreign governments. It not only- 
protected this property on the high seas, but followed it to foreign lands where it 
had been driven by the dangers of the sea, and protected it when cast even 
within the jurisdiction of hostile laws. It was protected against the invasions 
of Indians by your military p«wer and public treaties. In your statute book 
are to be found numerous treaties from the beginning of the Government to 
this time, compelling the Indian tribes to pay for slave property captured or 
destroyed by them in peace or war, and your laws regulating intercourse -v\'ith 
the Indian tribes on our borders made permanent provision for its protection. 
The treaty of Ghent provides for compensation by the British Government for 
the loss of slaves, precisely upon the same footing as for all other property, and a 
New England man, (Mr. John Q. Adams,) ably, faithful!)', and successfully, main- 
tained the slaveholders' rights under it at the Court of St. James, Until the year 
1820, our territorial legislation was marked by the same general spirit of fairness 
and equity. Up to that period, no act was passed by Congress asserting the pri- 
mary constitutional power to prevent any citizen of the United States, owning 



slaves, from removing with tbem into our territories, and there receiving legal 
protection for his property ; and until that time such persons did so remove into 
all the territories owned or acquired by the United States, (except the northwest 
territory,) and were there adequately protected. This fact alone is a complete refu- 
tation of the claim of early precedents. The action of Congress in reference to the 
ordinance of 1V87, does not contravene my position. That ordinance was adopted 
on the 13th day of July, IVSV, before the adoption of the Constitution. It pur- 
ported on its face to be a perpetual compact between the State of Virginia, the 
people of that territory, and the then Government of the United States. It was 
unalterable except by the consent of all the parties; when Congress met for the 
first time under the new Government on the 4th day of March, 1*789, it found 
the Government established by virtue of this ordinance in actual operation ; and 
on the 7th of August, 1789, it passed an act mating the officers of Governor and 
Secretary of the territory conform to the Federal Constitution. It did nothing 
more — iif. made no reference to, it took no action upon the 6th and last section 
of the ordinance, which prohibited slavery. The division of that territory was 
provided for in the ordinance ; at each division, the whole of the ordinance was 
assigned to each of its parts. This is the whole sum and substance of the tree- 
soil claim, to legislate precedents. Congress did not assert or exercise the right 
to alter a compact entered into with the former government, (the old confedera- 
tion,) but gave its assent to the government already established and provided for 
in the compact. If the original compact was void for want of power in the old 
government to make it, as Mr. Madison supposed, Congress may not have been 
bound to accept it, it certainly had no power to alter it. From these facts, it is 
clear, that this legislation for the northwest territory, does not conflict with the 
principle I assert, and does not furnish a precedent for hostile legislation by Con- 
gress against slavery in the territories. That such was neither the principle nor 
the policy upon which this act of Congress in 1789, was based, is further shown 
by the subsequent action of the same Congress upon the same subject. On the 
2d of April, 1790, Congress by a formal act, accepted the session by North 
Carolina of her western lands, (now the State of Tennessee,) with this clause in 
the deed of session — "that no regulations made, or to be made by Congress, shall 
tend to emancipate slaves" in the ceded territory, and on the 26th May, 1790, 
passed a territorial bill for the government of all the territory claimed by the 
United States south of the Ohio river. The description of this territory included 
all the lands ceded by North Carolina, and it included a great deal moi'e. Its 
boundaries were left indefinite because there were conflicting claims to all the rest 
of the territory. But this act put the whole country south of the Ohio, claiined 
by the Federal Government, under this pro-slavery clause of the North Carolina 
deed. The whole action of the first Congress in relation to slavery in the terri- 
tories was simply this: it acquiesced in a government for the northwest territory, 
based upon a pre-existing anti-slavery ordinance, established a government for the 
country ceded by North Carolina in conformity with the pro-slaveiy clause in her 
deed of cession, and extended this pro-slavery clause to all the rest of the tcivito- 
ry claimed by the United States. This legislation vindicates the first Congress 
from all imputation of having established the precedent claimed by the advocates 
of legislative exclusion. On the 7th of April, 1798, (during the administration 
of President John Adams,) the next territorial act was passed : it was the fissl ; - 1 
of territorial legislation resting solely upon primary, original, unfettered constitu- 
tional power over the subject. It established a government over the territory in- 
cluded within the boundaries of a line- drawn due East from the mouth of the Yazoo 
river to the Chatahoochee river, thence down that river to the thirty -first degree of 
north latitude, thence west on that line to the Mississippi, then up that river to the 
beginning. This territory was within the boundary of the United States, as defined 
by'the treaty of Paris, and was held not to be within the boundary of any of th(? 
States. The controversy arose out of this state of fiicts. The charter of Georgia 



8 

limited her boundary in the South by the Altamaha river. In 1763, (after the 
surrender of her charter,) her limits were extended on the South by the Crown 
of Great Britain, to the St. Mary's river, and thence on the thirty-first parallel of 
latitude to the Mississippi river. In 1764, it was claimed, that on the recommen- 
dation of the Board of Trade, the boundary was again altered, and that portion of 
territory lying within the boundaries I have described, was annexed to West Flori- 
da, and that thus it stood at the revolution and the treaty of peace. Therefore 
the United States claimed it as common property, and in 1*798, passed the act now 
under review for its government. In that act, Congress neither claimed or exercised 
any power to prohibit slavery. The question came directly before it — the ordinance 
of 1787, in terms, excluding the anti-slavery clause, was applied to this territory : 
this is a precedent directly in point, and is directly against the exercise of the power 
now chximed. In 1802, Georgia ceded her western lands, protecting slavery in her 
grant, and the Federal Government observed the stipulation. In 1803, we acquired 
Louisiana from France by purchase. There is no special reference to slavery in the 
treaty ; it was protected only under the general name of property. This acquisi- 
tion, was, soon after the treaty, divided into two territories, the Orleans and Lou- 
isiana territories, over both of which governments were established. Slavery was 
protected by law in the whole territory when we acquired it. Congress prohibi- 
ted the foreign and domestic slave-trade in these territories, but gave the express 
protection of its laws to slave-owners emigrating thither with their slaves. Upon 
the admission of Louisiana into the Union, a new government was established 
over the rest of the country, under the name of the Missouri Territory. This act 
attempted no exclusion, slaveholders emigrated to the country with their slaves 
and were protected by their government. In 1819, Florida was acquired by pur- 
chase ; its laws recognized and protected slavery at the time of the acquisition. 
The United States extended the same recognition and protection to it. In all this 
legislation, embracing every act upon the subject up to 1820, we find no warrant, 
authority or precedent, for the prohibition of slavery by CongTcss in the territories. 
When Missouri applied for admission into the Union, an attempt was then 
made, for the first time, to impose restrictions upon a sovereign State, and admit 
her into the Union upon an unequal footing with her sister States, and to 
compel her to mould her constitution, not according to the will of her own 
people, but according to the fancy of a majority in Congress. The attempt was 
sternly resisted, and resulted in an act providing for her admission, but containing 
a clause prohibiting slavery forever in all the territory acquired from France, outr 
side of Missouri, and north of 36° 30' north latitude. The principle of this law 
was a division of the common territory. The authority to prohibit even to this 
extent was denied by Mr. Madison, Mr. Jefterson, and other leading men of that 
dt.y. It was carried by most of the southern representatives combined with a small 
number of northern votes. It was a departure from principle, but it savored of 
justice. Subsequently, upon the settlement of our claim to Oregon, it lying 
north of that line, the prohibition was applied. Upon the acquisition of Texas, the 
same line of division was adopted. But when we acquired California and New 
Mexico, the South still willing to abide by the principle of division, again at- 
.tein])ted to divide by the same line. It was almost unanimously resisted by the 
northern States; their I'epresentatives, by a great majority, insisted upon absolute 
prohibition and the total exclusion of the people of the southern States from the 
whole of the common territories unless they divested themselves of their slave 
property. The result of a long and unhapoy conflict was the legislation of 1850, 
by it a large body of the representatives of the nou-slaveholding States, sustained 
by the approbation of their constituents, acting upon sound principles of consti- 
tutional construction, duty and patriotism, aided in voting down this new and 
dangerous usurpation, declared for the equality of the States, and protected the 
people of the territories from this unwarrantable interference with their rights. 
Here we wisely abandoned "the shifting grounds of compromise" and put the 



9 

rights of the people again " upon the rock of the Constitution." The Liw of 1854, 
(commonly known as the Kansas-Nebraska act,) was made to conform to this 
policy, and but carried out the principles established in 1850. It righted an an- 
cient wrong, and will restore harmony because it restores justice to the country. 
This legislation I have endeavored to show is just, fair, and equal ; that it is sus- 
tained by principle, by authority, and by the practice of our fathers ; I trust, I 
believe, that when the transient passions of the day shall have subsided, and rea- 
son shall have resumed her dominion, it will be approved, even applauded, by 
the collective body of the people, in every portion of our widely extended Re- 
public. 

In inviting your calm consideration of the second point in my lecture, I am 
fully persuaded that even if I should succeed in convincing your reason and 
judgment of its truth, I shall have no aid from your sympathies in this work; 
yet, if the principles upon which our social system is founded are sound, the 
system itself is humane and. just as well as necessary. Its permanence is based 
upon the idea of the superiority by nature of the white race over the African ; 
that this superiority is not transient and artificial, but permanent and natural ; 
that the same power which made his skin unchangeably black, made him inferior, 
intellectually, to the white race, and incapable of an equal struggle with him in 
the career of progress and civilization ; that it is necessary for his preservation in 
this struggle, and for his own interest as well as that of the society of which he is 
a member, that he should be a servant and not a freeman in the commonwealth. 

I have already stated that African slavery existed in all of the colonies at the 
commencement of the American revolution. The paramount authority of the 
Crown, Avith or without the consent of the colonies, had introduced it, and it was 
inextricably interwoven with the frame-work of society, especially in the southern 
States. The question was not presented for our decision whether it was just or 
beneficial to the African, to tear him away by force or fraud from bondage in his 
own country and place him in a like condition in ours. England and the Christian 
world had long before settled that question for us. At the final overthrow of 
British authority in these States our ancestors found seven hundred thousand Afri- 
cans among them, already in bondage, and concentrated from our climate and 
productions chiefly in the present slaveholding States. It became their duty to 
establish governments for themselves, and these people, and they brought wis- 
dom, experience, learning, and patriotism to the great work. They sought that 
system of government which would secure the greatest and most enduring hap- 
piness to the whole society. They incorporated no Utopian theories into their 
system. They did not so much concern themselves about what rights man 
might possibly have in a state of nature, as what rights he ought to have in a 
state of society; they dealt with political rights as things of compact, not of birth- 
right, in the concrete and not in the abstract. They held and maintained and 
incorporated into their system as fundimeutal truths, that it was the right and 
duty of the State to define and fix, as well as to protect and defend the individual 
rights of each member of the social compact, and to treat all individual rights as 
subordinate to the great interests of the whole society. Therefore, they denied 
"natural equality," repudiated mere governments of men necessarily resulting 
therefrom, and established governments of laws, — thirteen fi-ee, sovereign, and in- 
dependant Republics. A very slight examination of our state constitutions will 
show how little they regarded vague notions of abstract liberty, or natural equality 
in fixing the rights of the white race as well as the black. The elective franchise, 
the cardinal feature of our system, I have already shown was granted, withheld, 
or limited, according to their ideas of public policy and the interest of the State. 
Numerous restraints upon the supposed abstract right of a mere numerical 
majority to govern society in all cases, are to be found planted in all of our con- 
stitutions, State and Federal, thus afiirming this subordination of individual rights 
to the interest and safety of the State. 



10 

The slave-liokling States, acting upon these principles, finding the African race-' 
among tliem in slavery, unfit to be trusted with political power, incapable as free- 
men of securing their own happiness, or promoting the public prosperity, recog- 
nized their condition as slaves, and subjected it to legal control. There are abund- 
ant means of obtaining evidence of the eftects of this policy on the slave and society, 
accessible to all who seek the truth. We say its wisdom is vindicated by its re- 
sults, and that under it, the African in the slave-holding States is found in a better 
position than he has ever attained in any other age or country, whether in bondage 
or freedom. In support of this point, I propose to trace him rapidly from his 
earliest history to the present time. The monuments of the ancient Egyptians 
carry him back to the morning of time — older than the pyramids — they furnish 
the evidence, both of his national identity and his social degredation before history 
began. We first behold him a slave in foreign lands, we then find the great body 
of his race slaves in their native land, and after thirty centuries, illuminated by 
both ancient and modern civilization, have passed over him, we still find him a 
slave of savage masters, as incapable as himself of even attempting a single step in 
civilization — we find him there still, without government or laws or protection, 
without letters or arts or industry, without religion, or even the aspirations which 
would raise him to the rank of an idolater, and in his lowest type, his almost only 
mark of humanity is, that he walks erect in the image of the Creator. Annihilate 
his race to day and you will find no trace of his existence within half a score of 
years, and he would not leave behind him a single discovery, invention, or thought 
worthy of remembrance by the human family. 

In the Eastern Hemisphere he has been found in all ages, scattered among the 
nations of every degree of civilization, yet inferior to them all, always in a servile 
condition. Very soon after the discovery and settlement of America, the policy of 
the Christian World bought large numbers of these people of their savage masters 
and countrymen and imported them into the Western World. Here we are 
enabled to view them under different and far more favorable conditions. In Hayti, 
by the encouragement of the French government, after a long probation of slavery, 
they became free, and led on by the conduct and valor of the mixed races, and by 
the aid of overwhelming numbers, they tnassacreed the small number of whites who 
inhabited the island, and succeeded to the undisputed sway of the fairest and best of 
all the West India Islands under the highest state of cultivation. Their condition 
in Hayti left nothing to be desired, for the most fixvorable experiment of the race 
in self-government and civilization. This experiment has now been tested for sixty 
years, and its results are before the World. Fanatacism may paliate but cannot 
conceal the utter prostration of the race. A war of races began the very moment 
the fear of foreign subjugation ceased, and resulted in the extermination of the 
greater number of the mulattoes, who had rescued the African from the dominion 
of the white race. Revolutions, tumults and disorders, have been the ordinary 
pastime of the emancipated blacks; industry has almost ceased, and their stock of 
civilization acquired in slavery has been already nearly exhausted, and they are 
now scarcely distinguished from the tribes from which they were torn in their 
native land. 

More recently the same experiment has been tried in Jamaica, under the auspi- 
ces of England. This was one of the most beautiful, productive, and prosperous 
of the British colonial possessions. In 1838, England, following the false theo- 
ries of her own abolitionists, proclaimed total emancipation of the black race in 
Jamaica. Her arms and her power have watched over and protected them ; not 
only the interest, but the absolute necessities of the white proprietors of the land 
compelled them to off"er every inducement and stimulant to industry; yet the ex- 
periment stands before the world a confessed failure. Ruin lias overwhelmed the 
proprietors ; and the negro, true to the instincits of his nature, buries himself in 
filth, and sloth, and crime. Here we can compare the African with himself in 
both conditions, in freedom and in bondage; and we can compare him with his 



11 

race in the same climate, and following the same pursuits. Compare him with 
himself under the two different conditions in Hayti and Jamaica, or with his 
race in bondage in Cuba, and every comparison demonstrates the folly of his eman- 
cipation. In the United States, too, we have peculiar opnortuuies of studying the 
African race under different conditions. Here we find him in slavery ; here we 
find him also a free man in both the slaveholding and non-slaveholding States. 
The best specimen of the free black is to be found in the southern States, in the 
closest contact with slavery, and subject to many of its restraints. Upon the the- 
ory of the anti-slavery men, the most fevorable condition in which you can view the 
African ought to be in the non-slaveholding States of this Union. There we ought 
to expect to find him displaying all the capabilities of his race for improvement and 
progress — in a temperate climate, with the road of progress open before him, 
among an active, industrious, ingenious, and educated people, surrounded by sym- 
pathising friends, and mild, just, and equal institutions, if he fails here, surely it 
can be chargeable to nothing but himself. He has had seventy years in which to 
cleanse himself and his race from the leprosy of slavery, yet what is his condition 
here to day ? He is free : he is lord of himself; but he finds it is truly a "heritage 
of woe." After this seventy years of education and probation, among themselves, 
his inferiority stands as fully a confessed foct in the non-slaveholding as in the 
slaveholding States. By them he is adjudged unfit to enjoy the rights and per- 
form the duties of citizenship — denied social equality by an irreversible law of 
nature and political rights, by municipal law, incapable of maintaining the une- 
qual struggle with the superior race ; the melancholy history of his career of free- 
dom is here most usually found in the records of criminal courts, jails, poor-houses, 
and penitentiaries. These facts have had themselves recognized in the most 
decisive manner throughout the northern States. No town, or city, or State, en- 
courages their immigration ; many of them discourages it by legislation ; some of 
the non-slaveholding States have i^rohibited their entry into their borders under 
any circumstances whatever. Thus, it seems, this great fact of " iuferiority" of 
the race is equally admitted everywhere in our country. The northern States 
admit it, and to rid themselves of the burden, inflict the most cruel injuries 
upon an unhappy race ; they expel them from their borders and drive them 
out of their boundaries, as wanderers and outcasts. The result of this policy is 
everywhere apparent; the statistics of population supply the evidence of their 
condition. In the non-slaveholding States their annual increase, during the ten 
years preceding the last census, was but a little over one per cent, per annum 
even with the additions of the emancipated slaves and fugitives from labor from 
the South, clearly proving that in this, their most favored condition, when left to 
themselves, they are scarcely capable of maintaining their existence, and with the 
prospect of a denser population and a greater competition for employment conse- 
quent thereon, they are in danger of extinction. 

The southern States, acting upon the same admitted facts, treat them different- 
ly. They keep them in the subordinate condition in which they found them, pro- 
tect them against themselves, and compel them to contribute to their own and the 
public interests and welfare ; and under this system, we appeal to facts, open to 
all men, to prove that the African race has attained a higher degree of comfort 
and happiness than his race has ever before attained in any other age or country. 
Our political system gives the slave great and valuable rights. Hi's life is equal- 
ly protected with that of his master : his person is secure from assault against all 
others except his master, and his master's power in this respect is placed under 
salutary legal restraints. He is entitled by law, to a home, to ample food and clo- 
thing, and exempted from " excessive" labor ; and when no longer capable of la- 
bor, in old age and disease, he is a legal charge upon his master. His family, old 
and young, whether capable of labor or not, from the cradle to the grave, have the 
same legal rights ; and in these legal provisions, they enjoy as large a proportion 
of the products of their labor as any class of unskilled hired laborers in the 



12 

world. We know tliat these rights are, in the main, foithfully secured to them ; 
but I rely not on our knowledge, but submit our institutions to the same tests by 
which we try those of all other countries. These are supplied by our public 
statistics. They show that our slaves are larger consumers of animal food than 
any population in Europe, and larger than any other laboring population in the 
United States; and that their natural increase is equal to that of any other peo- 
ple ; these are true and undisputable tests that their physical comforts are amply 
secured. 

In 1790 there were less than seven hundred thousand slaves in the United 
States: in 1850 the number exceeded three and one quarter millions. The same 
authority shows that their increase for the ten years preceding the last census, to 
have been above twenty-eight per cent., or nearly three per cent, per annum, an 
increase equal, allowing for the element of foreign immigration, to the white race, 
and nearly three times that of the free blacks of the North. But these legal rights 
of the slave embrace but a small portion of the privileges actually enjoyed by him. 
He has by universal custom, the control of much of his own time, which is ap- 
plied, at his own choice and convenience, to the mechanic arts, to agriculture, or 
to some other profitable pursuit, which not only gives him the power of purchase 
over many additional necessaries of life, but over many of its luxuries, and in nu- 
merous cases, enables him to purchase his freedom when he desires it. Besides, 
the nature of the relation of master and slave begets kindnesses, imposes duties, 
(and secures their performance,) which exists in no other relation of capital and 
labor. Interest and humanity co-operate in harmony for the well-being of slave 
labor. Thus the monster objection to our institution of slavery, that it deprives 
labor of its wages, cannot stand the test of a truthful investigation. A slight ex- 
amination of the true theory of wages, will further expose its fallacy. Under a 
system of free labor, wages are usually paid in money, the representative of pro- 
ducts — under ours, in products themselves. One of your most distinguished 
statesmen and patriots, President John Adams, said that the difference to the 
State was " imaginary." "What matters it (said he) whether a landlord employ- 
ing ten laborers on his farm, gives them annually as much money as will buy them 
the necessaries of life, or gives them those necessaries at short hand." All expe- 
rience has shown that if that be the measure of the wages of labor, it is safer for the 
laborer to take his wages in products than in their fluctuating pecuniary value. 
Thereore, if we pay in the necessaries and comforts of life more than any given 
amount of pecuniary wages will buy, then our laborer is paid higher than the laborer 
who receives that amount of wages. The most authentic agricultural statistics of 
England show that the wages of agricultural and unskilled labor in that Kingdom, 
not only fails to furnish the laborer with the comforts of our slave, but even with 
the necessaries of life, and no slaveholder could escape a conviction for cruelty to 
his slaves who gave his slave no more of the necessaries of life for his labor than 
the wages paid to their agricultural laborers by the noblemen and gentlemen of 
England would buy. Under their system man has become less valuable and less 
cared for than domestic animals, and noble Dukes will depopulate whole districts 
of men to supply their places with sheep, and then with intrepid audacity, lecture 
and denounce American slaveholders. 

The great conflict between labor and capital, under free competition, has 
ever been how the earnings of labor shall be divided between them. In 
new and sparsely settled countries, where land is cheap, and food is easily pro- 
duced, and education and intelligence approximate equality, labor can successfully 
struggle in this warfare with capital. But this is an exceptional and temporary 
condition of society. In the Old World this state of things has long since passed 
away, and the conflict with the lower grades of labor has long since ceased. There 
the compensation of unsldlled labor which first succumbs to capital, is reduced 
to a point, scarcely adequate to the continuance of the race. The rate of increase 
is scarcely one per cent, per annum, and even at that rate, population, until re- 



13 

cently, was considered a curse ; in short, capital has become the master of labor 
with all the benefits, without the natural burdens of the relation. 

In this division of the earnings of labor between it and capital, the southern slave 
has a marked advantage over the English laborer, and is often equal to the free 
laborer of the North, llere again we are furnished with authentic data from which 
to reason. The census of 1850 shows that, on Cotton estates of the South, which 
is the chief branch of our agricultural industry, one-half of the arable lands are 
annually put under food crops. This half is usually wholly consumed on the farm 
by the laborers and necessary animals; out of the other half must be paid all the 
necessary expenses of production, often including additional supplies of food beyond 
the produce of the land, which usually equals one-third of the residue, leaving but 
one-third for net rent. The average rent of laud in the older non-slaveholding 
States is equal to one-third of the gross product, and it not unfrequently amounts to 
one-half of it, ( in England it is sometimes even greater, ) the tenant, from his por- 
tion, paying all expenses of production and the expenses of himself and family. 
From this statement it is apparent that the farm laborers of the South receive al- 
ways as much, and frequently a greater portion of the produce of the land, than 
the laborer in the New or Old England. Besides, here the portion due the slave 
is a charge upon the whole product of capital and the capital itself; it is neither 
dependent upon seasons nor subject to accidents, and survives his own capacity 
for labor, and even the ruin of his master. 

But it is objected that religious instruction is denied the slave — while it is true 
that religious instruction and privleges are not enjoined by law in all of the States, 
the number of slaves who are in connection with the different churches abundantly 
proves the universality of their enjoyment of those privileges. And a much larger 
number of the race in slavery enjoy the consolations of religion than the efforts 
of the combined Christian world have been able to convert to Christianity out of 
all the millions of their countrymen who remained in their native laud. 

The immoralities of the slaves, and of those connected with slavery, are con- 
stant themes of abolition denunciation. They are lamentably great; but it re- 
mains to be shown that they are greater than with the laboring poor of Eng- 
land, or any other country. And it is shown that our slaves are without the ad- 
ditional stimulant of want to drive them to crime, we have at least removed from 
them the temptation and excuse of hunger. Poor human nature is here at least 
spared the wretched fate of the utter prostration of its moral nature at the feet of 
its physical wants. Lord Ashley's report to the British Parliament, shows that in 
the capital of that empire, perhaps within hearing of Stafford House and Exeter 
Hall, hungel- alone daily drives its thousands of men and Avomen into the abyss 
of crime. 

It is also objected that our slaves are debarred the benefits of education. This 
objection is also well taken, and is not without force. And for this evil the slaves are 
greatly indebted to the abolitionists — formerly in none of the slaveholding States 
was it forbidden to teach slaves to read and write, but the character of the litera- 
ture sought to be furnished them by the abolitionists caused these States to take 
counsel rather of their passions than their reason, and to lay the axe at the root 
of the evil; better counsels will in time prevail, and this will be remedied. It is 
true that the slave, from his protected position, has less need of education than 
the free laborer who has to struggle for himself in the warfare of society ; yet, it 
is both useful to him, his master, and society. 

The want of legal protection to the marriage relation is also a fruitful source of 
agitation among the opponents of slavery. The complaint is not without founda- 
tion ; this is an'evil not yet removed by law, but marriage is not inconsistent with 
the institution of slavery as it exists among us, and the objection, therefore, lies 
rather to an incident than the essence of the system. But, in the truth and fact 
marriage does exist to a very great extent among slaves, and is encouraged and 
protected by their owners ; and it will be found,\ipon careful investigation, that 



14 

fewer cliildreu are bora out of wedlock among slaves than in the capitals of two 
of the most civilized countries of Europe — Austria and France : in the former, 
one-half of the children are thus born — in the latter, more than one-fourth. But 
even in this we have deprived the slave of no pre-existing right. We found the 
race without any knowledge of or regard for the institution of marriage, and 
we are reproached with not having as yet secured to it that, with all other 
blessings of civilization. To protect that and other domestic ties by laws forbid- 
ding, under proper regulations, the separation of families, would be wise, proper, 
and humane, and some of the slaveholding States have already adopted partial 
legislation for the removal of these evils. But the objection is far moi'e formida- 
ble in theory than in practice. The accidents and necessities of life, the desire to 
better one's condition, produce infinitely a greater amount of separation in fami- 
lies of the white than ever hajipens to the colored race. This is true, even in the 
United States, where the general condition of the people is prosperous. But it is 
still more marked in Europe. The injustice and despotism of England towards Ire- 
laud has produced more separation of Irish families, and sundered more domestic 
ties within the last ten years than African slavery has effected since its introduc- 
tion into the United States. The twenty millions of freemen in the United States 
are witnesses of the dispersive injustice of the old world. The general happiness, 
cheerfulness, and contentment of slaves, attest both the mildness and humanity of 
the system and their natural adaptation to their condition. They require no 
standing armies to enforce their obedience ; while the evidence of discontent and 
the appliances of force to repress it, are every where visible among the toiling 
millions of the earth ; even in the northern States of this Union, strikes and mobs, 
unions and combinations against employers, attest at once the misery and discon- 
tent of labor among them. England keeps one hundred thousand soldiers in 
time of peace, a large navy, and an innumerable police, to secure obedience to 
her social institutions ; and physical force is the sole guarantee of her social 
order, the only cement of her gigantic empire. 

I have briefly traced the condition of the African race through all ages and all 
countries, and described it fairly and truly under American slavery, and I submit 
that the proposition is fully proven, that his position in slavery among us is su- 
perior to any which he has ever attained in any age or country. The picture is 
not without shade as well as light ; evils and imperfections cling to man and all 
of his works, and this is not exempt from them. The condition of the slave offers 
great opportunities for abuse, and these opportunities are frequently used to violate 
humanity and justice. But the laws restrain these abuses, and punish these crimes 
ill this as well as other relations of life, and they who assume it as a fundamental 
principle in the constitution of man, that abuse is the unvarying concomitant of 
power and crime of opportunity, subvert the foundations of all private morals and 
of every social system. No where do these assumptions find a nobler refutation 
than in the general treatment of the African race by southern slave-holders : and 
we may with hope and confidence, safely leave to them the removal of existing 
abuses, and the adoption of such further ameliorations as may be demanded by 
justice and humanity. The condition of the African, (whatever may be his in- 
terests,) may not be permanent among us; he may find his exodus in the unvary- 
ing laws of population. Under the conditions of labor in England and the Conti- 
nent of Europe, domestic slavery is impossible there, and could not exist here, or 
any where else. The moment wages descend to a point, barely sufficient to sup- 
port the laborer and his family, capital can not afford to own labor and it must 
cease. Slavery ceased in England in obedience to this law and not from any 
regard to liberty or humanity. The increase of population in this country may 
produce the same results, and American slavery, like that of England, may find its 
eutlKuiasia in the general prostration of all labor. % 

The next aspect in which I propose to examine this question is, its efiects upon 
the material interests of the slave-holding States. Thirty years ago slavery was 



15 

assailed, mainly on the gTound that it was a dear, wasteful, unprofitable labor, and 
we were urged to emancipate the blacks, in order to make them more useful and 
productive members of society. The result of the experiment in the West India 
Islands, to which I have before referred, not only disproved, but utterly annihilated 
this theory. The theory was true as to the white race, and was not true as to 
the black, and this single fact made thoughtful men pause and ponder before ad- 
vancing further with this folly of abolition. An inquiry into the wealth and pro- 
ductions of the slave-holding States of this Union demonstrates that slave labor 
can be economically and profitably employed, at least in agriculture, and leaves 
the question in great doubt, whether it cannot be thus em])loyed in the South 
more advantageously than any other description of labor. The same truth will 
be made manifest by a comparison of the production of Cuba and Brazil not only 
with Hayti and Jamaica, but with the free races, in similar latitudes, eno-aged 
in the same or similar productions in any part of the world. The slave-holding 
States, with one half of the white population and between three and four millions of 
slaves, furnish above three-fifths of the annual exports of the Republic, containing 
twenty-three millions ot people, and their entire products including every branch 
of industry greatly exceed ]per capita those of the more populous northern States. 
The diftereuce in realized wealth in proportion to population is not less remarkable 
and equally favorable to the slave-holding States. But this is not a fair compari- 
son, on the contrary it is exceedingly unfair to the slave-holding States. The 
question of material advantage would be settled on the side of slavery, whenever 
it was shown that our mixed society was more productive and prosperous than 
any other mixed society with the inferior race free instead of slave. The question 
is not whether we could not be more prosperous and happy with these three 
and a half millions of slaves in Africa and their places filled with an equal number 
of hardy intelligent enterprising citizens of the superior race, but it is simply 
whether while we have them among us we would be most prosperous with them 
in freedom or bondage; with this bai'e statement of the true issue, I can safely 
leave the question to the facts already heretofore referred to, and to these disclosed 
in the late census. But the truth itself needs some explanation, as it seems to be 
a great mystery to the opponents of slavery, how the system is capable at the 
same time of increasing the comforts and happiness of the slave, the profits 
of the master, and do no violence to humanity. Its solution rests upon very ob- 
vious principles. In this relation, the labor of the country is united with and 
protected by its capital, directed by the educated and intelligent, secured against 
its own weakness, waste, and folly, associated in such Ajrm as to give the greatest 
efficiency in production, and the least cost of maintainance. Each individual free 
black laborer is the victim not only of his own folly and extravagance, but of his 
ignorance, misfortunes, and necessities. His isolation enlarges his expenses, with- 
out increasing his comforts ; his want of capital increases the price of every 
thing he buys, disables him from supplying his wants at favorable times, or on 
advantageous terms, and throws him in the hands of retailers and extortioners. 
But labor united with capital, directed by skill, forecast and intelligence, while it 
is capable of its highest production, is freed from all these evils, leaves a margin 
both for increased comforts to the laborer and additional profits to capital. This 
is the explanation of the seeming paradox. 

The opponents of slavery, passing by the question of material interests, insist 
that its eftects on the society where it exists is to demoralize and enervate it, and 
render it incapable of advancement and a high civilization ; and upon the citizen 
to debase him morally and intellectually. b'Uch is not the lesson ta.iglit by his- 
toiy, either sacred or profixne, nor the experience of the past or present. 

To the Hebrew race were committed the oracles of the most High, slavehold- 
ing priests administered at his altar, and slaveholding prophets and ])atriai'chs re- 
ceived his revelations and taught them to their own and transmitted them to all 
future generations of uien. The highest forms of ancient civilization, nnd the no- 



16 

blest development of the individual man, are to be found in the ancient slave- 
holding 0' mmonwealths of Greece and Rome. Tn eloquence, in rhetoric, in po- 
etry and paintincf, in architecture and sculpture, you must still go and search amid 
the wreck and ruins of their genius for the "pride of every model and the per- 
fection of every master," and the language and literature of both, stamped Avith 
immortality, passes on to mingle itself with the thought and the speech of all 
lands and all centuries. Time will not allow me to multiply illustrations. That do- 
mestic slavery neither enfeebles or deteriorates our race ; that it is not inconsistent 
with the highest advancement of man and society, is the lesson taught by all ancient 
and confirmed by all modern history. Its effects in strengthening the attachment 
of the dominant race to liberty, was eloquently expressed by Mr. Burke, the most 
accomplished and philosophical statesman England ever produced. In his speech 
on conciliation with America, he uses the following strong language : " Where this 
is the case those who are free are by far the most proud and jealous of their freedom. 
I cannot alter the nature of man. The fact is so, and these people of the southern 
colonies are much more strongly, and with a higher and more stubborn spirit 
attached to liberty than those to the northward. Such were all the ancient 
commonwealths, such were our Gothic ancestors, and such in our day were the 
Poles, such will be all masters of slaves who are not slaves themselves. In such 
a people the haughtiness of domination combines itself with the spirit of freedom, 
fortifies it and rendei-s it invincible." 

No stronger evidence of what progress society may make with domestic slavery 
can be desired, than that which the present condition of the slaveholding States 
present. For near twenty years, foreign and domestic enemies of their institu- 
tions, have labored by pen and speech, to excite discontent among the white race, 
and insurrections among the black ; these efforts have shaken the National Gov- 
ernment to its foundations, and bursted the bonds of christian unity among the 
churches of the land, yet the objects of their attacks — these States — have scarcely 
felt the shock. In surveying the whole civilized world the eye rests not on a sin- 
gle s]>ot where all classes of society are so well content with their social system, 
or have greater reason to be so, than iu the slaveholding States of this Union. 
Stability, pi-ogress, order, peace, content, prosperity, reign throughout our borders. 
Not a single soldier is to be found in our widely-extended domain to overawe or 
protect society. The desire for organic change nowhere manifests itself. Within 
less than seventy years, out of five feeble colonies, with less than one and a half 
millions of inhabitants, have emerged fourteen Republican States, containing 
nearly ten millions of inhabitants, rich, powerful, educated, moral, refined, pros- 
perous and happy ; each with Republican governments adequate to the protection 
of public liberty and private rights, which are cheerfully obeyed, supported and 
upheld by all classes of society. With a noble system of internal improvements 
penetrating almost every neighborhood, stimulating and rewarding the industry 
of our people ; with moral and intellectual surpassing physical improvements ; 
with churches, schoolhouses and colleges daily multiplying throughout the 
land, bringing education and religious instruction to the homes of all the people, 
they may safely challenge the admiration of the civilized world. None of this 
great improvement and progi-ess have been even aided by the Federal Govern- 
ment; we have neither sought from it, protection for our private pursuits, nor 
appropriations for our public improvements. They have been efi"ected by the 
unaidfd individual efforts of an enlightened, moral, energetic and religious people. 
Such is our social system, and such our condition under it. Its political wisdom 
is vindicated in its etfects on society; its morality by the practices of the patri- 
archs and the teachings of the apostles ; we submit it to the judgment of man- 
kind, with the firm conviction that the adoption of no other system under our 
circumstances would have exhibited the individual man, bond or free, in a higher 
development or society in a happier civilization. 



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